Catching my breath

Last week was a bit of a bear.  A jury summons coincided with a couple of big deadlines at work.  I managed to complete most of the work tasks over the [previous] weekend — which was good, but also left me rather drained at the beginning of the week.

I cooled my heels for two days in the jury gathering room, part of this debacle; they had far more jurors than expected, leading to some interesting times on Monday morning.  They never called my number, and I was released late on Tuesday afternoon.

Instead of spending Wednesday addressing my growing paid-work and housework lists, I was home with sick Sir.  Thank goodness he’s not sick much (knock on wood), because he transforms from a sometimes-challenging, but usually pretty easygoing and low-key kid to an ab. so. lute. bear when he’s sick.  From Wednesday through Friday, it felt like we just moved from one meltdown to another, with some snotty-nose-wiping in between.

His antics had me alternating from annoyance to unable to suppress my laughter at the absurdity.  On Thursday, I told him we had time to listen to two songs before his nap.  After the second song, he started requesting the third track on the CD, “Jimmy Cracked Corn.”  I told him we would listen to that after nap; he disagreed and collapsed to his knees, sobbing “Jimmy Cra Cor” over and over again, while bouncing up and down with snot and tears streaming down his face.  I was torn between trying to comfort him (and get him down for an obviously much-needed nap) and getting out the video camera (I chose the former).

Earlier that morning, he had a breakdown when Matthew left for work.  Gabriel didn’t get to the window in time to blow him a kiss, and that was all it took.  It started out sweet that he really wanted to blow Daddy a kiss, but after several minutes of inconsolable crying, the sweetness lost it shine, replaced by eye rolling and mutters of, “Good Lord, child!”

There were some okay moments, too, but by the time my MIL arrived to pick him up late Friday afternoon, I was beyond exhausted (turns out I was getting sick, too) and close to the end of my rope.  Gabriel had Baba time for the next 24-hours, and we managed to salvage Valentine’s Day and transition to a fairly nice, if low-key and still sick, weekend.

I’m looking forward to a more normal week and returned health for all of us!